Africa-Press – Mauritius. Do you have a different reading of the controversy and the new questions raised following the exercise of counting the votes of constituency no. 19 on Tuesday, February 1? Do you think the newly discovered anomalies lift the lid on irregularities that may be committed in other constituencies, or is it all down to human error?
Jack Bizlall: Two questions arise. The first concerns the electoralism of the opposition parties to provoke new elections in constituency No 19. By-elections which can open the floodgates to general elections with a return of the Bérenger and Ramgoolam tandem.
It is an electoral strategy to remove the Jugnauth Dynasty from power. The aim, in its political objective, is desirable, but it is a war between political dynasties that I reject as much in its existence as in its essence.
The second is of political importance within the framework of republican democracy. In my opinion, our electoral system is more monarchical than republican and, thus, more dynastic than it was before 1992.
I met the Commissioner just after the last elections to tell him about the observations of the May Day Movement and the Observatory for Democracy. The mobility of voters between the 2014 and 2019 elections is inexplicable, and it is even more troubling when the comparison is made between rural and urban constituencies.
I was shocked at this finding. The real problem is the crumbling trust in the electoral commission. This problem needs to be fixed. The Commissioner has great responsibilities to assume.
He must meet the political parties, and do so quickly. In the past, I have testified before a parliamentary committee chaired by Burty David about the introduction of electronic voting.
I was against it and I had spoken to David personally to tell him to put this project in the fridge. Lately, we’ve been talking about postal voting. But not for now, I believe.
We must follow what happened in the United States during the last presidential elections. Nothing replaces the current system because it is based on total control from voter registration to vote counting.
I am much more in favor of closing the polls at 6 p. m. and counting the ballots immediately afterwards. The results must be known the same evening. * The opinion of opposition parties and political observers or even civil society on such issues matters.
But you have to rely on the hard facts – the evidence – to draw objective and definitive conclusions about the integrity of the electoral process in Mauritius in recent years, right? The Electoral Supervisory Commission curiously remains silent, and it is therefore up to the Electoral Commission to reveal everything…
The electoral commission will not reveal anything. It is calling all past elections into question. The government, as we have already done, can pass a law in the National Assembly to legalize these elections.
It is to grant even more power to the regime in place to impose its autocratic policy. You have to be blind not to understand the danger represented by the Jugnauth regime.
However, I caution power seekers against desperate political action. Ramgoolam and Bérenger probably think that to find themselves in power, it’s now or never.
Yet both of them are responsible for what is happening in our country. They sold this country to a power dynasty. They are the cause and the effects of the betrayal of Labor as of Militancy.
Point bar. I make an analogy with the keyboard of the electoral machine. * Be that as it may, it does not appear that the other electoral petitions will have any impact on the survival of the current government.
The Prime Minister has absolute control over his troops, the key institutions of the country, such as the police, the ICAC, etc. seem reluctant to rock the boat and, in addition, he commands a comfortable majority in Parliament.
What do you think? You only partially raise the problem – quite obvious – of the monopolization of all political powers and of the state apparatus. I go further to say that all economic levers come under the control of this dynasty.
Just look at what has been done with the ongoing appointments since 2014. Most notable was the appointment of Navin Beekarry. We forget our past. Let’s be insightful.
If we find that the regime controls everything, then to weaken the electoral commissioner is to push him out and thus be replaced by one who is subject to the dynasty.
Be careful. Being insightful means advocating for a new constitution. I note that little by little the political parties subscribe to this project. A publication made and signed by Milan Meetarbhan, Joseph Tsang Mang Kin, Rajen Narsinghen, Jocelyn Chan Low, Alain Laridon and myself, will soon come off the presses.
The Observatory for Democracy intends to take two initiatives: Set up an Election Observatory With Catherine Boudet, we have already worked on its constitution, its ethics and its operation.
We were supposed to launch it in 2019 but time ran out. The publication of a book on all the scandals in Mauritius We have completely forgotten the Medpoint affair like so many other scandals.
The list is long. We have already listed and elaborated on these scandals in a text which must be published within the framework of the next elections.
* Moreover, for lack of professionally and objectively conducted surveys, we are not able to capture all or at least a good part of the opinions of Mauritians on various issues concerning politics, the current economic situation or even politicians in power and those in opposition.
What do your contacts with the base tell you about these different reports? I have been explaining for years the emergence of the middle class in a capitalist society that desocializes work.
This motley class is controlling everything. Its agents are in control of all our formal and informal institutions. Their political practices, neither left nor right, lead to populism of all kinds. They are everywhere. Parliament, Judiciary, Executive, Companies, Unions, NGOs, Media. . . At the grassroots level, the biggest concern is debt.
I am sickened by what I hear and what I see in relation to the ongoing epidemic; disgusted by the opportunism of each other to monopolize everything that presents itself to have money and to be in the political bed of the rulers.
The middle class is terrifying here as elsewhere. In France, the nationalist, regal, racist extreme right with names like Reconquest or National Rally… as rebellious as the populist title of Mélenchon’s Party.
The lefts are retreating – social democrats, ecologists, revolutionaries; the left is retreating here as elsewhere because of the inability of their leaders to break out of social classes.
* What about future prospects?
I am overwhelmed by the anarchic situation that currently prevails… anarchic corporations shaken by statements and actions of people who present themselves as saviors as they dismantle all that has been built.
I am in the middle of writing a letter to restore purchasing power, rebuild bodies such as the Employment Relations Tribunal and the Commission for Conciliation and Mediation.
Why ? To protect employment from anti-Republican disciplinary proceedings; To protect households; To combat over-indebtedness against the implosion of pension funds, etc.
; To establish ethics and apply codes of conduct…
I am active in many fields: union negotiations, publication of books supporting the union struggle, theoretical and practical studies. I deal with a lot of publications these days.
My priority will be a publication on wages and over-indebtedness. You will be shocked: I am confronted with the eagerness of the workers. In many sectors, workers are selfish and they do not think it is appropriate to protect the most fragile sectors.
They want everything and now. On the ground, there are a number of greedy and mercenary trade unionists. There are revolutionaries who are in the pay of the capitalists. There are lawyers who are also mercenaries… The battle will be tough. It is within this framework that the workers must create a radio net.
* Do you think that those who voted for the various opposition parties perceive the PTr-Entente de l’Espoir alliance project, still at the stage of discussions at the level of the various leaders, as a credible and winning alternative?
This alternative has no credibility with Ramgoolam as an inspirer surrounded as he is by pleasure seekers who prevent change at the head of this party.
I’m sorry: he has to go. I wrote to him on this subject, the Labor Party must be rebuilt… As for the adherents of militancy, they cannot find themselves behind the MMM.
But the drama is the journalism that is practiced, it is only event-based – that is to say, it is based on the practice of privileging the event without describing and explaining political actions with positions through investigative and opinion journalism.
* Another issue that affects the planting community: the reform of the sugar industry as proposed by the World Bank.
Here is an industry which suffers annual losses of Rs 1.4 billion but whose survival is ensured by the injection of public funds of Rs 1.5 billion per year, and which could be saved after ten years.
through the implementation of a series of measures including the voluntary withdrawal of 800 to 2,000 employees, financed by public funds. Should we save this industry?
It is not without reason that the number of jobs is falling in the sugar industry: sugar production is falling due to a reduction in the area planted with cane.
This production will decline further. But we are importing more and more sugar to satisfy our guaranteed exports and for our local consumption. There is a change and NOT a drop in income.
There is a change in the sources of income for the sugar industry. Some expect huge profits with the construction of smart cities that implant social apartheid.
Banks are increasingly involved in financial transactions abroad. Analyze the MCB’s income, reserves and indirect investments. The hotel sector will go through a phase of split and sell. We will go through a phase of investment swapping with the direct and indirect privatization of state companies and activities.
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